The latest in the growing number of efforts directed at reducing, repurposing and ultimately eliminating waste in all its forms.
Innovative carpet-tile manufacturer and environmental pioneer Interface has announced its participation in 'Healthy Seas, a Journey from Waste to Wear' — a new initiative designed to address the growing environmental problem of marine waste. Interface is the first flooring company to participate in this global program, founded by yarn manufacturer Aquafil, conservation group ECNC Land & Sea Group, and Dutch manufacturer Star Sock, as part of Interface's long-term 'Mission Zero' sustainability goal.
Sainsbury's has announced that its new store at Weymouth Gateway will be water neutral — 100 percent of its water demand will be met through water-efficient infrastructure and offsetting partnerships in the local community, and the total water used within the local catchment area will not increase as a result of this new store. The grocery retailer says it will also replicate this approach at its new supermarket in Leicester, opening at the end of November.
Best Buy, Dell, HP and Samsung have won the Consumer Electronics Association’s (CEA) inaugural eCycling Leadership Award, which recognizes consumer electronics companies that recycle above and beyond levels mandated by government.In 2011, CEA announced the eCycling Leadership Initiative to increase the amount of recycled consumer electronics to one billion pounds annually by 2016, an effort known as the Billion Pound Challenge. CEA says the industry is on track to meet this goal by recycling 585 million pounds of products in 2012.
The Hershey Company announced two more of its plants have achieved zero-waste-to-landfill (ZWL) status. The chocolate maker now has six U.S. plants that no longer dispose routine waste into landfills. With the addition of the Y&S Plant in Lancaster, Pa., and the Robinson Plant in Robinson, Ill., Hershey has exceeded its goal to convert five plants to ZWL by 2015 well ahead of schedule.“Converting plants to ZWL is challenging, but our plant employees have shown how deeply dedicated they are to environmental stewardship,” said Terence O’Day, SVP and Chief Supply Chain Officer at the Hershey Company. “They have worked extremely hard to reach this important milestone.”
UK paper manufacturer James Cropper has developed another innovative recycling process that incorporates cocoa husk waste from chocolate production into unbleached cellulose fiber to produce a food-grade paper. The company says turning the otherwise wasted skins of many of the 3.5 million metric tons of cocoa beans produced each year into paper could be a significant breakthrough for the food and packaging industries.The paper is now in production and certified for use in the food supply chain, including as wrapping for chocolate bars.
Waste Management has announced it is building a facility that will create pipeline-ready natural gas from its Milam Landfill in Fairmont City, Ill. At a ceremony last week at the landfill, state, county and local officials joined the company to celebrate the groundbreaking.The processed renewable natural gas will be injected into the pipelines of utility provider Ameren Illinois for withdrawal at other locations, including some Waste Management facilities. Once there, it will be used to fuel truck fleets and other equipment that run on compressed natural gas (CNG). Waste Management is calling the plant the Renewable Natural Gas Facility and expects it to begin delivering gas to the pipelines in late summer 2014.
Today, UK grocery retailer Tesco unveiled food waste figures for its operations and supply chain, alongside figures that show 68 percent of bagged salad in particular is wasted and that 35 percent of this waste occurs in the home.As a first step in reducing this waste, Tesco announced it will end multi-buys on large bags of salad and is developing mix-and-match promotions for smaller bags in a bid to help customers reduce the amount they are wasting at home.Bagged salad is just one of the 25 best-selling grocery products that Tesco has tracked from farm to fork to gain a detailed understanding of where food waste occurs. This is part of the grocer’s commitment to lead in tackling food waste and to work with suppliers and customers to address this.
Nestlé today announced it will achieve zero waste in all 150 of its European factories by 2020, meaning no factory waste will go to landfill or be incinerated without energy being recovered from the process.“The decision to achieve zero waste illustrates Nestlé’s commitment to environmentally sustainable business practices,” said Laurent Freixe, Nestlé Executive Vice President and Zone Director for Europe. “We already have over 25 factories in Europe that do not dispose of waste into the environment.“By relentlessly eliminating all sources of waste, or by recycling or recovering energy from unavoidable residues, I am convinced we can achieve the same for all our European operations,” Freixe said.Cleaning up
Each week leading up to our SB London conference, where the winner of the SB London Innovation Open (SBIOL) will be announced on November 18, we will get to know each of our four finalists. This week, meet the SBIOL public vote winner, O2E Technologies.
UK households waste £6.9 billion ($11 billion) worth of food and drink, or 7 percent of overall sales, each year, according to new research from WRAP.The organization estimates that the grocery retail supply chain produces roughly 6.5 million tons (Mt) of annual waste. Of this, 3.9 Mt is derived from food and drink manufacturers, with the majority being food.
Just in time for Oktoberfest, the Hofmühl Brewery in Eichstätt, Bavaria has announced that a combination of solar and bioenergy is not only supplementing its energy supply, but making it completely self-sufficient, according to 2degrees.
Boeing and Oracle Team USA are collaborating to recycle 7,000 pounds of carbon fiber from USA-71, a yacht built for the America's Cup campaign in 2003. The hull and mast of the racing yacht will be processed and repurposed — a first-of-its-kind effort for what could be the largest carbon structure ever recycled.Boeing and Oracle Team USA say they are working with research partners to utilize a technique developed to recycle composite materials from Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, which is 50 percent composite by weight and 20 percent more fuel-efficient than similarly sized aircraft.
Italian biotech firm Bio-on has developed a bioplastic called PHA (Polyhydroxyalkanoate), made from agricultural processing waste materials, which is 100 percent biodegradable in water and soil and can be used as a substrate for electric circuits. When combined with suitable nanofillers, the polymer can act as an electricity conductor, with the potential of replacing plastics in most electronics.The company says the use of PHAs can help put a dent in the 50 million tons of waste produced worldwide every year from discarded smartphones, tablets, computers and other electronics.
Rogers Family Company says it has developed a single-serve coffee product that is 97 percent biodegradable.The coffee company claims an estimated 9.1 billion single-serve coffee and drink cartridges – some 19 million cubic feet of waste – end up in U.S. landfills each year. According to the National Coffee Association, more than a tenth of U.S. households (12 percent) own single-cup coffee brewers, and that number is on the rise.Rogers Family Company says it created the OneCup BIO to address this longstanding waste challenge and meet the demands of increasingly environmentally conscious consumers.
The thousands of tons of waste seashells created by the edible seafood sector are being used to treat wastewater in a new project undertaken by researchers at the University of Bath in the UK.Dr Darrell Patterson, from the University’s Department of Chemical Engineering, used waste mussel shells to create what he says is a cheaper and more environmentally friendly way of ‘polishing’ wastewater, which could remove unwanted substances such as hormones, pharmaceuticals or fertilizers.
Just in time for Halloween, Sims Recycling Solutions, a global electronics reuse and recycling company, today announced the launch of Zombie Phone, an online service that allows individuals to sell their used cell phones directly to Sims. Based in Australia, Sims Recycling Solutions operates 16 North American sites in Arizona, British Columbia, California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Nevada, New Jersey, Ontario, Quebec, Tennessee and Texas.To begin the buyback process, visitors to the Zombie Phone website select their current wireless carrier and identify the make, model and condition of their phones. Based on this information, an offer is instantly calculated.
Food waste is a huge problem in America and globally, with up to 40 percent of perfectly good food being trashed in the US, according to a study by Harvard and the Natural Resources Defense Council. Yet there's a lack of nutritious food in US inner cities and elsewhere.So the ex-president of Trader Joe's is trying to put supply and demand together to create a new form of food retailing. Doug Rauch plans to open a new market, the Daily Table, in Dorchester, Mass., early next year to sell "repurposed" food as is, in lightly processed form — like a fast-food restaurant.
In 2010, Jenny Dawson was a couple of years out of university working at a hedge fund company in London. One day, she found herself at a wholesale market where she saw pallets of edible fruit and vegetables going to the waste bin. The food had been grown in neighboring countries in Europe and as far away as Kenya.To Dawson it was sheer madness and an environmental and social travesty that so much good food requiring great resources to grow and transport to London would ultimately end up in the garbage. “Seeing pallets of perfectly good fruit coming in from Kenya destined for the garbage evoked a reaction in me. There must be something we could do. We can’t be this wasteful,” says Dawson.
This week, investors are asking General Mills to take responsibility for recycling its post-consumer packaging waste.
Intel treats at least two million gallons of industrial water a day at its plants in Chandler, Ariz., then returns the water to an underground aquifer, according to Bloomberg.The company, which is the city’s largest employer, recycles 60 percent of its water. It also is expanding the treatment facilities and increasing the amount it reuses while it constructs a $5 billion plant that will make more efficient computer chips.Bloomberg says Intel’s Chandler plants use nine million gallons of water a day, of which five million is reused or reclaimed.